Calling all you hungry ghosts

all the lost and the left behind.

Gather round and share this meal

your joy and your sorrow, I make it mine. —Kanromon

The hungry ghost in Buddhism symbolizes the part of us that is constantly hungry for something else, yet never satisfied.

Whether we find our craving grasping for our cell phones, another drink, another smoke, pornography, food, sex, relationships, status, success, self improvement or something else—we are probably all familiar with the part of us that wants more. Often depending on what is craved, this part of us and this part in our world is often buried in shame or hidden in secrecy.

In dharma practice we are invited to welcome all the lost and seemingly left behind parts of ourselves. This is a practice of deep self-compassion that inevitably extends beyond our personal experience with the hungry heart and opens up compassion for this energy that is very alive in our society and our world.

Join us for this seasonal meditation + ceremony. We will be creating an altar to the hungry ghost and you are welcome to bring something for the altar (you are welcome to put your cell phone on the altar for the evening) or anything else that symbolizes something that your hungry heart grasps for, or that the archetypal energy of the hungry ghost grasps for.

This ceremony is a ceremony of welcome and beginning to recognize that once welcomed, and fed the nourishment of our kind curious attention, the energy of the hungry heart is often be transmuted into bodhicitta (the energy of awakened compassion).

You are also welcome to come in costume, dressing up like one of the manifestations of your hungry ghost.